Pedophilia In America

[bumab]

Originally Posted by Tormod

Lately there have been some cases of women molesting boys over here. I would think there is a lot of hush-hush about this issue.

Or is it because the boys are less likely to report the molestation?

[IrishEyes]

I'm on a quest for stats, but they are rather difficult to find, it seems.
I appreciate you telling us your opinion, Tormod. And the rest of you as well. I agree with beccareb that there should be a differentiation between consensual sex, and pedophilia. However, I do not understand why some people should be granted leniency because they make the 'mistake' of having sex with a minor.

I am tired of seeing different psychiatrist and psychologist on CNN talking about the psychological trauma that those poor kids experienced. I would like to see one psychiatrist on television with a different opinion. They usually respond by saying something like a child that is 13 or 14 is not capable of making responsible decisions and they should not be engaging in sexual activity. My response to that is it all depends on the way parents raise their children. A large percentage of Americans parents are over protective and conservative. If a child grows up in a home with parents that are liberal and not over protective the child will have a higher probability of being more mature and being more prepared for the real world at an earlier age. If you want your child to make irresponsible decisions you should keep your child in a bubble and try to control their lived as much as possible. That is something that a lot of American parents are good at.

This just blew me away, really. Do you have some sort of stats or studies that can back you up here, or are you just speaking off the cuff? Is there any chance that maybe the psychiatrists know what they are talking about, since they went to school for years to earn their degrees? Could it possibly be that a 12 or 14 year old is NOT capable, mentally, of making an informed decision to have sex?

I know that at 15 years old, I really thought I was ready to have a sexual relationship with my boyfriend. He did not pressure me, and he was quite willing to wait if I said no. However, I thought I was old enough, that I was mature enough, and that I knew what was best for me. Luckily, I didn't end up with any diseases and I didn't get pregnant. However, I can say that looking back, it would have been much better to wait. At 15, I was NOT ready, but at 15, I didn't realize that.

We have laws saying that a person has to be 18 before they can buy cigarettes and 21 before they can buy alcohol. Why shouldn't it be the same, or very similar, for having sex? In some states, you get a stiffer penalty for selling a 15 year old a pack of cigarettes than you do for having sex with the same 15 year old. I really don't understand that at all. What kind of message is that sending?

[IrishEyes]

Or is it because the boys are less likely to report the molestation?

Interesting point. Without stats, just from experience, men seem much more proud of a sexual encounter, even if they were 'seduced'. I think that most boys would have the same attitude. Most guys I remember in high schoold would have given their (pick a body part) for the chance to have sex with an older woman.

After a quick search, I found a site with some rather disturbing stats...

http://www.rainn.org/statistics.html

-Every two minutes, somewhere in America, someone is sexually assaulted.
-About 44% of rape victims are under age 18.
-Three out of every twenty victims (15%) are under age 12. [Sex Offenses and Offenders. Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, 1997.]
-Seven percent of girls in grades five to eight and twelve percent of girls in grades nine through twelve and said they had been sexually abused. [Commonwealth Fund Survey of the Health of Adolescent Girls, 1998.]
-Three percent of boys in grades five through eight and five percent of boys in grades nine through twelve said they had been sexually abused. [Commonwealth Fund Survey of the Health of Adolescent Boys, 1998.]
-93% of juvenile sexual assault victims knew their attacker; 34.2% were family members and 58.7% acquaintances. Only seven percent of the perpetrators were strangers to the victim. [Sexual Assault of Young Children as Reported to Law Enforcement. Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, 2000]
-In 1995, local child protective service agencies identified 126,000 children who were victims of either substantiated or indicated sexual abuse; of these, 75% were girls. Nearly 30% of child victims were between the ages of 4 and 7. [US Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Child Maltreatment, 1995.]
-Age 12-34 are the highest risk years. Risk peaks in the late teens: girls 16 to 19 are four times more likely than the general population to be victims of rape, attempted rape or sexual assault. [2000 NCVS.]

Granted, these stats are not just indicative of pedophilia. But they are disturbing, nonetheless.

[alxian]

Originally Posted by bumab

Or is it because the boys are less likely to report the molestation?

brings up the old issue of does molestation affect the development of young boys, or does that early awakening affect them at all?

and of course if there is such thing as a woman raping a male.... *no comment

[IrishEyes]

Originally Posted by Tormod

Do we have any kind of stats to show this? Lately there have been some cases of women molesting boys over here. I would think there is a lot of hush-hush about this issue.

Do you mean that sexual molestation in general is kept hush-hush, or that the cases of women molesting boys is kept hush-hush?

Originally Posted by alxian

.... should have moved to norway when i had the chance....

This was a joke, right? If not, it may describe the difference between molestation of girls or boys. The perceptions seem to be different. If you hear about a 25 year old man that has sex with a 14 year old girl, most people are very disturbed. In reverse though (25 year old woman with a 14 year old boy), it seems that the boy is more likely to be patted on the back than labeled as a 'victim of abuse'.

[IrishEyes]

brings up the old issue of does molestation affect the development of young boys, or does that early awakening affect them at all?

Are you suggesting that there is a difference between girls and boys, regarding whether or not sex at an early age could be traumatic?

[IrishEyes]

and of course if there is such thing as a woman raping a male.... *no comment

It depends on the definition of rape, I suppose. I'd always heard "you can't rape the willing", but that doesn't seem entirely true, especially in light of this discussion. I think that there are circumstances where a woman can be considered guilty of raping a man. A few different scenarios come to mind, besides the one mentioned here involving a grown woman and a minor.

[KickAssClown]

I would like to point the Desscusion of this particular matter to what I concider an invaluable resource regarding Children-Adult interaction and Culture.

Now please keep in mind that this is a contraversal issue and the individual in question is more or less Rediculed if not straighted out Violently opposite by the so called Experts.

His name is Lloyd deMause. I highly recommend all his books.
http://www.psychohistory.com/htm/bio.html

[alxian]

ok, so yes what i meant was to raise those rather colloquial beliefs.

of course i'm not saying that boys can't be raped or molested but that that double standard is why soceity hasn't done away with child molestation already. its still a joke and isn't taken seriously by the molesters and their peers.

zero tolerance wouldn't do any good either because you'd have to educate the children and potentially expose them even more to adulthood before they are ready. hmmm make the mean age 18? once a person has ripened and had access to a formal education in terms of the world and sexuality too? yes.. if i'm elected president of the world in 2020 i'll be sure to ratify something ridiculous like that.. no sex till marriage no marriage till 18, offenders will be maimed and sterilized.

[IrishEyes]

Thanks, KAC, for that link. Looking into that site further, I did some interesting reading.

http://www.psychohistory.com/htm/06a1_incest.html

The time when one could deny that sexual seduction is extremely traumatic for children appears to have ended. The more studies that come out on the effects of childhood sexual abuse, the more severe the damage is found to be. The flood of books and articles documenting the emotional problems of victims both in childhood and in later life has to be read in detail to appreciate the profound sense of betrayal and the terrifying fears felt by the child, so that even single incidents have the power to permanently ravage their lives. Severe somatic reactions, depersonalization, self-hatred, hysterical seizures, depression, borderline personality formation, promiscuity, sexual dysfunctions, suicide, self-mutilation, night terrors and flashbacks, multiple personalities, post-traumatic stress disorders, delinquency, bulemia, and the overall stunting of feelings and capacities have all been documented - the earlier and the more often the abuse, the worse the damage.(76)